


A Course for the Thunderbolt

by LauranicusPond



Series: Pretty, Petty Thieves [3]
Category: Hat Films - Fandom, The Yogscast
Genre: Gargoyles - Freeform, Light Angst, Pain (not like in a sexy way), Urban Magic Yogs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-21
Updated: 2016-06-21
Packaged: 2018-07-16 11:04:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7265470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LauranicusPond/pseuds/LauranicusPond
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A Gargoyle likes to watch storms from the roof of his church. An early, pre-Garbage Court UMY story.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Course for the Thunderbolt

**Author's Note:**

> I can only apologise for the amount of 'The Gargoyle' and 'he' in this because god freaking darn it I hate epithets but there's a reason for it I swear.
> 
> Don't think I missed anything in the tags but as always please let me know if anything needs adding

The gargoyle lets his feet dangle over the edge of the stone wall of the gallery, listening to the rain patter down. He watches ripples in one of the puddles where the roof leaks, drumming the tip of his tail in time with the quiet splashing echoing around the empty church.

He likes rain. Rain brings things to the church for shelter. The cat, and then the kittens that followed, had stayed for a long time. The pile of moth-eaten hassocks the gargoyle had gradually brought her to curl up in still sits in the corner by the organ. He hopes that they’ll come back one day. He also knows that they probably won’t.

The rain grows heavier, and the wind wuthers through the broken pane in the stained glass. He wishes, not for the first time, that he could find something to patch the glass with, but aside from the church furniture, there’s nothing to be had. He doesn’t want to break up the place he’s meant to be protecting. Not that he’s doing a very good job, he thinks.

A crash of thunder rings out, lightning flashes, and beside him on the wall, the sleeping pigeons wake with a flurry of feathers.

“Shh... Just thunder...” The gargoyle murmurs. He reaches slowly over to the nearest bird, cooing softly. He strokes his finger gently over the bird’s head before drawing his hand back. “I’m going to watch the storm. I’ll be back soon...” He tells them, swinging his legs around and making his way along the gallery.

He digs his hands into the wall and climbs up slowly, pressing clawed fingers and toes into well worn grooves in the stone. He pulls himself up through a hole in the wood and tiles, and hauls himself onto the roof. A tile slips back through the hole and bounces onto the stone gallery, shattering.

The gargoyle steadies his feet and carefully shifts down the roof until he’s standing on the flat stone around the edge of the roof. Water rolls down his horns and over his face, and he smiles, throwing out his arms, and stretching his carved feathered wings out behind him with a happy sigh. He’s glad of the dark and the rain, too afraid of being seen to come out more often. He stands, perfectly still. Rain trickles over his shoulders and his back, the soft white of his marble skin slowly turning shimmering pale grey as he gets wetter.

He walks slowly around the edge of the roof, stopping at the corner and crouching down next to the stone gargoyle there. This one is decidedly less magical, stone face weathered and grotesque, water pouring from the spout in his mouth. This one’s wings are different too, carved bat-like and spiny. Gargoyles and bosses and chimeras, all meant to scare away threats to their churches. He sighs and gets to his feet again, shaking water out of his eyes.

Thunder rings out again, and he hums, turning to try and see the lightning bolt, wherever it might be. Light fills the sky for a second, but he can’t see where it strikes, and frowns slightly, drawing his eyebrows together. After a moment’s hesitation, the gargoyle starts to climb back up the roof, tail whipping back and forth behind him, past his hole in and out, and further, up to the stone cross on the highest point.

He traces his fingers over the writing carved on the horizontal bar of the cross, words he knows by heart.

_Save yourself, and come down from the cross._

The gargoyle wonders on them for a moment before shrugging and pulling himself up onto the base of the cross.

It’s almost his height, just right for him to rest his arms over the horizontal bar, press his cheek against the side of it as he waits for the next round of thunder and lightning. He beats his wings gently, getting a little of the water off before folding them up behind him again. He curls his tail around the bottom half of the cross, tapping a gentle beat.

He can see almost the whole city from here, he thinks. He watches a series of lights turn on and off in an apartment a few streets across, imagines the person living there, wonders what they’re doing. Wonders if they’d see him, had they stopped to look out of the window.

Thunder crashes, and the gargoyle beams in delight as he spots the lightning arc down across the sky. The rain comes down in sheets, blown almost horizontal by the wind. He hopes that the storm doesn’t end too quickly, shakes his head again to get water out of his eyes. He hears the thunder again, leans back to look for the lightning.

The sky flashes, and he barely has time to turn his head before a sharp, searing pain courses through his body and down his back. He steps back instinctively, grabbing blindly at the cross as he slips off the base. There’s a sharp crack of shattering stone, and then he’s falling backwards. He crashes through the roof and down, and down, and down, until his back hits the stone floor of the church.

The gargoyle’s whole body pulses with pain, tail twitching out from under him. He tries to move, to sit up, but moving sends pain shooting through his shoulder blades and he feels sick with it. He reaches out with one hand, grabbing for anything that he could pull himself up with. His fingers meet broken stone. Broken, beautifully carved stone. He blinks, confused, and brings a piece of it up. It takes him a second, his vision swimming, barely able to focus on what’s in front of him.

Feathers. He rubs his thumb back and forth gently over it. Oh.  

The gargoyle lets the stone fall, his arm dropping back down. The fingers of his other hand are still clutching part of the cross from the roof, he realises. He can’t summon the energy to lift his arm, instead tracing his thumb over the worn, rectangular piece of rock in his hand, feeling the letters. An 'R', an 'O', an 'S', and another 'S'.

He closes his eyes, feels the rain drip down the sides of his face. He lies amongst the rubble of his ruined wings until he feels the sun warm the smooth marble of his skin once more.     

**Author's Note:**

> I mostly wrote this because I don't think I've ever really seen an explanation for Ross's name in this AU other than it kind of being plucked out of thin air, and this came to mind and kinda stuck there. It's real bible verse, on the cross, it's Mark 15:30. 
> 
> The gallery of a church is the kind of balcony that runs around the top of the nave, they were usually for musicians or minstrels to play in, or just for decoration. I learnt a lot about church architecture through this fic. 
> 
> I like to imagine Ross plays the organ for his animal friends sometimes, even though half the keys no longer work.


End file.
